1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to the verification of an individual's identity in a wide area network. More specifically, this invention relates to a method and apparatus for verifying identity using fractional information taken from the user.
2. Description of the Related Art
For many years, the global retail market has been characterized as a market in which products are sold from physical locations. In recent years, however, this dynamic has undergone a significant change in response to the increasing popularity of the Internet. It should be appreciated that the Internet is defined here as a collection of interconnected (public and/or private) networks linked together by a set of standard protocols (such as TCP/IP and HTTP) to form a global, distributed network. While this term is intended to refer to what is now commonly known as the Internet, it is also intended to encompass variations which may be made in the future, including changes and additions to existing standard protocols. Using the Internet, businesses can now more readily sell their products to a vast number of customers beyond local boundaries. Business transacted primarily over computer networks such as the Internet is commonly known as electronic commerce and will herein be referred to as such.
Systems for wide-area networks, such as the Internet, are presently limited, however, in the amount of security they offer to consumers and businesses against fraud. In particular, in electronic commerce it is commonplace to approve electronic transactions without ever seeing the purchaser or viewing any identifying material (such as a drivers license). In addition to financial fraud, the Internet has also experienced a growing problem with regards to age representation fraud, whereby underage individuals are able to gain unauthorized access to many websites on the Internet by claiming to be older than they actually are. To prevent such unauthorized access (and in general, to prevent other forms of fraud and theft), it is desirable to confirm the identity and/or age of the user requesting access to restricted material by checking an identifying code supplied by an unknown user against publicly available identity databases. For example, if a social security number is supplied, this information can then be used to verify other information about the user, such as the user's age, gender, credit history, state of residence, etc. For further example, many Internet age-verifying services operate chiefly by obtaining a user's credit card number over the Internet.
While it is certainly possible in an electronic commerce transaction to request identifying information about an individual, such as a full social security number, credit card number, or a telephone number, individuals are in many situations reluctant to give such information for fear of compromising their privacy or risking loss of control over their confidential identifying and account information. Individuals may be particularly reluctant to share identifying information when the reputation of the requesting entity is not known to the user, and its trustworthiness is therefore in question. Currently, no system exists that enables users to verify certain facts about themselves, such as their age, without forfeiting their privacy and supplying confidential identity numbers to a potentially untrustworthy requestor. If these disadvantages could be overcome, it is anticipated that more electronic commerce transactions would occur than presently take place. It would thus be advantageous to implement an electronic business method and system which enables businesses to verify the identity of such clients at a minimal risk to the clients' privacy and without needing to posses confidential identity numbers belonging to the clients.